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jimmylegs wrote:harry i hope you caught the relationship between zinc and uric acid and glutathione also, not just the iron thing.

gains, if you take inosine it's one thing, but if your uric acid is low due to a zinc deficiency, all the inosine in the world won't correct that.

further, if you consume high purine foods (which i tried for a couple years with no influence whatever on my ms-average uric acid levels) without adequate zinc, your liver cannot convert amino acid breakdown products to uric acid. all that happens is the ammonia byproduct from which uric acid is made (using zinc) goes up - people with low uric acid can have high levels of ammonia in their system.

This was really interesting and i have a question about Glutathione as i've read that Whey Protein is one of the best foods to raise Glutathione in the body but i also know that many think that dairy may not be good for those of us with these autoimmune neural disorders.

I think it is highly advisable to get your uric acid and zinc levels checked before going in for any supplements. It may require a little bother and expensive but both zinc and UA are very bad in excess (glutathione's okay as far as I know - incidentally NAC is often touted as the best way of delivering glutathione). If you take any chelator make sure you also get regular Vit C.

JL - you are definitely the undisputed zinc expert! I knew that low levels of of UA and zinc were fairly common in MS but I did not realise, till I read your post, that without sufficient zinc UA and glutathione levels are not able to rise.

However, while we're still on the subject of iron chelators, let's not forget:

1. There are free iron deposits in the brains of everyone with MS. This iron can potentially cause oxidative damage and death to nerve tissue (as happens in Parkinson's).

2. UA and Glutathione are very promising supplements (as has been shown in preventing Parkinson's Disease and treating mice with rodent MS). With the benefit of hindsight it looks as if this may be largely because they are iron chelators.

'Wonder food' green tea has so many countless benefits. It is a very powerful free radical scavenger and iron chelators. Unfortunately tea is also a UA antagonist...... but this shouldn't stop anyone from taking it...just make sure your UA levels are nice and high first. High, but in the safe zone.

Harry - you drink lots of Green Tea, I do too, but do you know how effective it actually is in removing iron? There are papers on the subjectt but I have no subscriptions..

And Gainsbourg, or anyone who knows in fact, 'non-free' iron occurring naturally in foods, you say that there is no danger of iron contained within them being harmful. This is of course true with those foods being consumed whilst taking vitamin C supplements which facillitate the uptake of iron?

A related question - would vitamin C have any effect on iron chelation?

And drugs like desferrioxamine to be used for 'acute iron overload following transfusions' - they aren't appropriate for us but best for decreasing iron load in blood?

(Not sure if anyone can answer this, searching on the forum doesn't reveal much although, wow a coincidence, I just searched for the post that I wanted to quote and it was you Gainsbourg! "Managed to track down a June 2000 study carried out in Kansas where the iron chelator desferrioxamine (desferral) was given to nine volunteers with chronic progressive MS - at intervals over two years. One improved, three remained stable but in the other five the disease continued to progress (but only by "0.5%") "

Apologies for my terrible username. I never thought I'd use the forum much when I registered..

ElMarino wrote:Harry - you drink lots of Green Tea, I do too, but do you know how effective it actually is in removing iron? There are papers on the subjectt but I have no subscriptions..

Nope i don't how effective it is although i assume the Green Tea capsules are better than the Tea Bags that i've been using for several years as i think the capsules/tablets have higher amounts of EGCG from my understanding..

Glad you mentioned that Kansas study that tested iron chelation for PPMS over 2 years. It stopped the progression of MS in almost HALF of those who took part and dramatically slowed the progression in the others.

As far as I know vitamin C does not actually chelate iron (as it does mercury, for example) but its antioxidant effect is known to prevent free iron damage. Maybe the combined chelation and antioxidant effects of raw, fresh vegan diets explains why some individuals have reported miracle cures of MS after following these diets....perhaps they've gradually got rid of their free iron deposits!

With regard to green tea, I think it's unwise to skip the caffeine unless you just can't stomach the tea, because the caffeine has also been found to be neuro-protective and may be working in combination with the EGCG.

In the meantime, (sorry for the repetition) if you have MS, Parkinsons or Alzheimers, never ever eat fortified breakfast cereals or white rice (it's "enriched" with iron by law) and limit refined flour based products (also "enriched") like white bread and pasta. This is exactly the non-heme iron that I believe is destined for the iron deposits in your brain.

This means no more cornflakes, no more branflakes. If you still haven't read the Parkinson's disease study about this it's here. I must have read it ten times...each time I read it I feel a shiver. It took 16 years to carry out and looked at the iron consumption of about 120,000 doctors, dentists and other health professionals.

Thanks for that gainsbourg. I shall look in to UA and Glutathione. I never ate much cereal so avoiding that is east (I'm almost a vegan, I mean I occasionally eat dairy but I don't eat so much raw food..)

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